AN ENGLISH CUBIST

WILLIAM ROBERTS:

The Port of London

Illustration © The Estate of John David Roberts. Catalogue information based on the catalogue raisonné by David Cleall. For this and full details of the exhibitions cited, see the links below. Any auction prices quoted may not include all fees and taxes, such as VAT and Artist's Resale Right charges.

The Port of London (aka River Scene?), c.1922
Oil on canvas, 53.3 cm x 74.8 cm

The Newcastle 2004 catalogue identifies The Port of London with River Scene exhibited at the Chenil Galleries in 1923, but the £12 price in the 1923 catalogue suggests that that was a relatively minor work.
PROVENANCE: ? > Redfern Gallery > ? > Kenneth Levy > Tate Gallery (T05761, presented 1990 through the Friends of the Tate Gallery, Helena and Kenneth Levy Bequest, dated c.1920–24)
EXHIBITION HISTORY: Chenil Galleries 1923 (as River Scene)?, Tate Gallery 1991, Newcastle 2004, Tate Britain 2012
Cf. Shipping 1922
In his memoir Early Years, Roberts describes how, when at school, during a visit to the Tate Gallery he had been impressed by an earlier painting of the Pool of London, Toil, Glitter, Grime and Wealth on a Flowing Tide (1883) by William Lionel Wyllie (1851–1931) (whom Roberts misremembered as Maurice Greiffenhagen).

William Lionel Wyllie, Toil, Glitter, Grime and Wealth on a Flowing Tide, 1883